Roybecca
by practice4morale
Summary: This fic is where I'm dumping writer's block exercises. Basically gives me the freedom to write anything I want. 'Roybecca' is Roy's gender-bended name and it has nothing to do with anything. This fic will consist of one-shots and miniseries that aren't related to each other. Features different genres, universes, cannon junk, and plenty of Naes :D
1. Baby Corn

**This fic is where I'm dumping writer's block exercises. Roybecca title isn't a pairing. It's Roy's gender-bended name and it's the best gender-bended name ever. No particular reason I picked that for the title besides maybe it gives you some idea of how seriously I'm taking this fic. It's supposed to relieve stress from writing all disciplined and conscientious. Here I'm just going to write what I want at any given time. That is all.**

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_I'm starting with a child!Maes because I've got baby corn on the brain. Plus, I need some bromance!Ed and Roy. Not cohesive with FL/BBG/etc. plotlines. At all. I'm doing it third person limited because I don't practice 3__rd__ POV enough._

1. Anger and Acceptance

"How'd he happen?" Roy said absently as the infant-sized toddler slowly nodded off on the couch beside him.

How'd he happen? Almost a genuine question in its own way.

Edward raised his eyebrows. "Um, maybe you should talk to your mom about that, Mustang."

Ed's hand was rested on Maes's thin back so lightly that it was like his touch was hovering. Maes obviously liked the contact, but contact was hard to pull off for a parent trying not to restrict his son's ribs from expanding through breaths. Ed had heavy hands.

Roy rolled his eyes. "I meant more along the lines of how'd a kid like him come from a brat like you?"

Ed snorted. "Beats me."

Roy thought about commenting on how Maes did inherit his father's childhood pipsqueak status, but even to his own mind the words were like acid. You don't make jabs about a terminally ill kid being small.

Maes was sleeping on the couch between the men. Nina was napping with the women, bandaids stuck on her fingertips, no doubt, in the Elric's nursery while Winry tended to the new baby. It was sickening, that they'd had to put Nina with the Elric's newborn during naptime because of the nightmares. Waking the baby with Nina's screams was a lesser evil than waking Maes. He was that in need of rest. Roy had imagined new families tip-toeing around waking the baby. The Elric mindset seemed to be more along the lines of, 'Why the hell would we care about waking the baby? Maes is the sick one.' Put things into perspective, that was for sure.

"Can't wait until he starts talking more," Ed said softly. He wore a restrained smile like excitement might become airborne and stir Maes into waking.

"He's been talking our ears off since we got here," said Roy with a chuckle.

Ed shook his head. "No, he wants to say more. You can see it in his face. He gets tired. That's all. The words stop making it out of him before he's ready to quit."

Roy knit his brow. This family. It was baffling. Maes was barely two years old and he'd apparently been talking since he was seven months. Most kids his age were still babbling in fragmented sentences with heavy speech impediments and trains of thought that were nearly indecipherable at least half the time. Here Maes was, more articulate than Nina had been at three. His development was reminiscent of a genius in the making.

But Ed didn't see things in terms of above-standard child development. He saw Maes's mouth getting tired as he spoke.

Edward drew his hand from Maes's body. It took Roy a moment to realize Maes was coughing. No, not coughing. His little body was contracting and his breath was making coughing noises in his throat, but it couldn't be called coughing. It was more like he was choking.

"Hey, buddy," Edward said quietly. He turned Maes gently by his bony shoulders and eased him upright. Ed's expression was concerned, but his eyes were tired. He'd done this before. "Take a breath, Maes. Come on, kiddo."

Maes eyes pulled open in a daze. The disorientation left him quickly as he seemed to realize he'd forgotten how to breathe again. Maes turned a pleading gaze up to his dad. Edward rubbed Maes's back with expert gentleness that still seemed to put firm enough pressure on Maes's shuddering ribs to spur a forced exhale.

Maes coughed hard and gasped so deeply that it made Roy's throat sting in a split moment of sympathy. Maes continued coughing as he let himself lay back in a tiny limp ball. Edward set his hand on Maes's sweaty, golden head. The little boy shifted himself just enough to indicate he wanted to lean his head on his father's leg and Edward helped him the rest of the way. Maes's eyelids dropped. He fell back into sleep.

"I'm a little surprised he goes back to sleep so willingly," said Roy in a whisper. "Nina does everything she can to avoid it."

"Makes sense given how she tends to wake up," said Edward.

"Yeah."

"Maes doesn't know different," said Edward. "Has trouble breathing all the time. He sleeps when he needs to."

"Guess that makes sense, too."

Ed rocked his head back, his mouth creasing in an angry frown. "I'm so sick of this."

Roy looked past the living room door and wondered how Nina was doing, if she'd gotten deep enough into sleep to dream yet. "Yeah."

"Damn it, Mustang. Why'd we get stuck with such good kids?"

Roy laughed thinly. "Because it would be easier if they deserved it?"

Ed closed his eyes. "Screw it."

"It's funny how he talks about his sister," said Roy.

Ed opened his eyes. He looked at Roy with a furrowed brow. "What?"

Roy looked down at Maes's peaceful sleeping face. "How he calls her his Sophie. It's funny."

Ed laughed. "I know. When Winry was pregnant, he'd be all over her stomach talking about _his_ baby." Ed stroked Maes's hair. "Now it's all about his Sophie. We had him on the phone with Paninya the other day and he asked her, 'When are you going to come see my Sophie?' That's how he introduces her. Not just Sophie. No. _My_ Sophie."

Roy felt a smirk coming on. Bragging on Edward Elric's kids was a risky business. Once Ed got started, he'd make your ears bleed before he'd exhausted all his inflated pride for his kids. A little like Hughes. A lot like him, actually. Roy had to admit it was refreshing in its own way.

Ed frowned. "That came out of nowhere."

"Hm?" said Roy.

"What you said about Maes being funny," said Edward. "That was kind of random. Where'd it come from?"

Roy shrugged. "I don't know. Just thinking about our kids, how they get along. Maes and Nina make sense, I guess, but Sophie's the only semi-normal one. Big brother doesn't seem to have a problem with it. Made me think of how they get along."

Ed didn't appear to take the thought with the same apathy Roy had as he'd said it. Edward frowned. His hand ran gently over Maes's silky hair, smoothing strands that had fallen around Maes's closed eyes.

Roy slumped. "What'd I say this time?"

"Semi-normal?" Ed said. "What the hell does that even mean? What's normal?"

The question sounded dangerously rhetorical. Roy hesitated at answering. "I don't know. I just meant Sophie hasn't had it rough so far. That's different for this bunch."

Ed's frown deepened. "Don't say crap like that. So far? Seriously? She's a month old!"

Roy huffed. "You know that's not how I meant it. Calm down."

"Yeah, I know what you meant," said Ed between gritted teeth. "So, what? My toddler not having hard feelings over getting the short end of the genes means he deserves some kind of gold star? Jeez, Mustang! He's two years old. He doesn't know what's going on. You think the whole _my Sophie_ thing is going to last once he's figured out mom and dad only screwed up on him? Like hell he's not going to have a problem with it!"

Maes grunted. Ed's eyes widened as Maes peered up at him in sluggish slits.

"Library voice, please," said Maes in his tiny toddler squeak.

Ed rubbed Maes's arm. "Sure. Sorry, bud."

"I forgive you," said Maes.

Roy remembered when Nina had sounded that small. Really, she still tended to be a little on the shrill side most of the time. Had driven her kindergarten teacher crazy the first couple weeks of school. Nina's speech was so fast and high pitched that it was hard to make out what she was saying to people who didn't know her very well.

Maes closed his eyes again and dropped back to sleep. Ed let out a breath. He looked at Roy, deflated.

"Just forget it, okay?" he said in a whisper.

"I don't see him resenting his sister, Edward."

Ed closed his eyes in an irritated way. "I said forget it. Jeez. I know, okay? He's too nice. I almost wish he would get angry." Ed's expression tightened at the end like he wasn't looking forward to being argued with. Just tired of it.

"Welcome to my world," said Roy. "Nina's going on six and we still can't get her to tell us what ticks her off. I mean, there's got to be some part of her that gets angry. Never seems to make it to the surface, though."

"But it's there," said Edward. "I can see it in his face. When he gets those coughing fits and can't catch his breath, I can see him getting angry at himself. He gets angry that he needs mom and dad to help him. He just won't get angry at mom or dad."

"So, with any luck, he'll get angry at his sister from time to time?"

Ed groaned. "Look, I'm trying, okay? I don't know what the heck's best. Just figuring it out as I go."

"Can't fault you for that."

Roy extended his arm to pat Maes lightly on the shin. Ed gave him a questioning glance. Roy hadn't made a habit of extending physical comfort beyond his immediate family. Roy let out a breath.

"Edward…" Roy watched Maes sleep with hoarse breaths. "What happened to all that stuff you told me about not letting your kids' defects become their identities?"

Ed looked away. "That was a while ago."

"You changed your mind?" Doubtful.

"No," said Ed. "Just isn't as easy as I'd counted on it being."

Roy raised his eyebrows. "_You_ expected fatherhood to be easy? You're joking."

Ed rolled his eyes. "As a matter of fact, I did. When I talked about defects, I was talking about special needs. I hadn't counted on raising a kid that might very well die before I do. Yes, Mustang. I'd expected it to be a hell of a lot easier than this. This shit's a little hard to overlook, wouldn't you say?"

Roy swallowed. He'd never admit it, but sometimes it was hard just being in the same room with Edward, especially since Maes had come into the picture. It wasn't that Edward was consistently bitter or anything. Actually, he was often the most positive person in the room these days. It was something else about Ed that made him hard to be around. You could practically feel the waves of self-restraint pulsing around him, how much he was holding back. Edward really did have a certain knack for stumbling into the ugly parts of life.

"Damn," said Edward. "Surprised you even remember that stupid conversation."

Roy nodded. He wasn't sure he wanted to admit that that _stupid conversation_ had changed his whole view on parenting and shaped his daughter's life since. Not mentioning that fact wasn't just a pride thing, though. In some way, it seemed an insensitive thing to say in the moment.

Roy took in the look on Edward's face. Gold eyes heavy. Skin pale and drained. Mouth a tight line that threatened to express more than Ed would've liked.

"You're right, Mustang," said Edward. "I do need to get my act together. Winry's bad enough on her own. Maes doesn't need two moping parents."

Roy looked away. Suddenly the idea behind reminding Edward to be strong for his family seemed a little shallow now that Ed was agreeing with him.

"He's been doing better since we got him on the new steroids," said Edward. "So, not all hopeless. No hospital visits this month or last."

Roy winced. Ed was cheering himself up. And it was…pathetic.

Edward laid his hand lightly over Maes's body like a fleshy blanket. "Sorry. Guess I've made a habit of chewing you out this visit."

Roy frowned. "You just apologized?"

"No. I meant the other kind of sorry that isn't used in apologies."

Roy shook his head. "Forget what I said, okay? You could stand to get angry more often."

Ed laughed. "Yeah, because I haven't done that enough in my life."

"Seriously," said Roy. "You're not going to break me."

Because, who else was Ed allowed to get angry at these days? His fragile wife? His newborn daughter? His invalid son? There was no way. Not even Al could take it when Ed directed his anger at him. That had been proven. Ed wasn't allowed to get angry.

Which just wasn't natural.

"Idiot bastard," said Edward in a sulk. "Go make yourself some oatmeal or something."

Roy chuckled. He'd figured out a long time ago. This was how Ed told him not to worry. So, he'd picked up on it. Again.

"I'll pass," said Roy.

"Don't remember saying it was a suggestion," said Ed with a joking roll of his eyes.

Maes seemed to huddle closer against Ed's thigh for a moment, an unconscious movement. The kid was so much like Nina that way. Just loved being held. Some kids Roy had seen wanted nothing to do with their parents once they hit a certain age. He didn't see that happening with Nina or Maes. He just didn't.

Ed smiled down at Maes fondly. "I don't know, Mustang. Maybe he doesn't need to get angry yet. I mean, look at him."

Roy watched Maes wheeze in his sleep and tried to get some idea of Edward's point. He didn't come up with much.

"I just remembered what I told you," Edward said. "That conversation. I got on your case because you only looked at the stuff Nina was missing out on. Jeez. Look at him, Mustang. He knows he's missing stuff and he's fine with it. I mean, he's happy."

Roy took Ed's words in. In that conversation, Ed had scolded Roy for focusing on the bad things in Nina's life when she only saw the good things. Ed wasn't talking about that right now, though. He was scolding himself for focusing on the bad things in Maes's life when Maes had already accepted them. It was sad.

But it was making Ed smile.

"He's like my mom," said Edward softly. "Everyone says he takes after his uncle because he's got such a mild temperament, but Maes isn't Al. He's more like Mom was. Always smiling. Happy when there's nothing to be happy about." Ed shook his head. "And Mom did just fine without a temper."

Maes let out a nasally sound that ended with a snort, like a failed attempt at breathing through his nose. He blinked awake. The poor kid couldn't make it ten minutes without being woken up by his airways.

Maes rolled over to look up at his father. Edward bowed his head slightly to look straight down at Maes like a kind of game. Maes's slightly parted lips smiled. Ed smiled back.

"Okay, I know that face," said Ed. "Someone needs a break from sleeping."

Funny. Usually people talked about taking breaks from being awake.

"You thirsty, kiddo?" said Ed.

Maes nodded. His eyes shifted sideways. He covered his mouth to cough. He left his hand rested over his mouth and said squeakily, "Where is my Nina?"

Roy felt his shoulders tighten. _His_ Nina? For some reason, that just didn't sound as cute as _Maes's_ Sophie.

"She's having her nap still," said Edward. "Didn't sleep too well last night."

Maes nodded. "My Nina was crying so loud in her bed."

_His_ Nina. Roy shuddered. Having Nina claimed, even by a two year old little boy, was unsettling. Particularly the little boy part.

Still, Roy couldn't help but be a little impressed at the depth of concern in Maes's eyes. That and the innate sympathy the children seemed to have established for each other. It was a happy ache, watching the two interact, how Nina would take Maes's hand when he went into a coughing fit and how she wouldn't let go until about a minute after he was stable again. How Maes told her elaborate stories about his favorite breakfast cereals at the table to distract her after a nightmare. How he'd told her the scars on her legs were pretty like little purple clouds. Nina had repeated the compliment to Roy at least fifteen times over the next couple of days. 'Maes says I've pretty much got pieces of the sky on my legs, Daddy,' she'd said. 'He says I can have his cornflakes kind of anytime I want. No milk at all. He said so. I have to eat the cornflake cereal plain, Maes told me. It's the rules.'

Roy chuckled to himself at the way Maes was clinging to Edward as he stood. Ed had Maes secure in his arms and Maes still made an effort to attach himself to his dad like a little leech. Reminded Roy of when Nina was a toddler, how he used to joke about her trying to become part of his shirt. She'd cling so tight. Part of Roy wished they hadn't had to force Nina out of the original separation anxiety. He missed the days when she hadn't wanted anyone but Mommy or Daddy.

"My Sophie is sleeping too?" asked Maes with a hand on his dad's face.

Ed nodded. "Baby sister's sleeping too. Don't worry. You've got time for another nap before they wake up."

Maes yawned into Ed's shoulder. "Uh huh."

Poor Maes didn't want to miss anything. Roy had caught onto how Maes tried to synch up the times he was awake with the times everyone else was awake. It was interesting how aware Maes seemed to be about it, how other people's schedules fit with his.

"Uncle Roy?" Maes said.

Roy looked up from the couch. Ed was standing in front of him with Maes looking down from Ed's arms. Roy smiled.

"How can I help you, Maes?" he said.

Maes blinked, seeming to give what Roy had asked some thought. Finally, he said, "I don't know."

"Oh?" said Roy.

Maes looked at his dad and shrugged his arms. "How can he help me?"

Ed laughed. "Tell Uncle Roy what you wanted to say, buddy."

Maes looked back down at Roy. "You can have some of my cornflakes."

Roy fought a smile. Maes was bribing him into coming to the kitchen with them. With Maes so sick all the time, Roy assumed the boy was a little deprived as far as regular social interaction went. Roy had seen how Maes worked, how he tended to cling onto company when he could get it. Like the way he was clinging onto Ed.

Roy stood. "I graciously accept. Thank you, Maes."

"You're welcome," said Maes with an excited grin.

Roy watched Ed interact with his son, how Maes's face lit up as Ed joked about him getting big and heavy. Ed's eyes, no matter how much they smiled, always had something lingering, some darkness wearing at him. He carried something that never seemed to go away, just faded to be less noticeable at times.

All the same, Ed was happy. Even with the gut-wrenching reality of Maes's constant illness and the heartbreaking truth that the boy could be outlived by his father, there was an underlying joy that held Ed steady. He was happy to be a dad, and not just because Ed liked being a dad. He was happy to be a dad because Maes had decided he was happy to be a son.

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**Aw! Enjoy those pointless feels. I needed to write and I'm brain-dead on stuff with plots today. R&R!**


	2. Maes Goes Metal: Part 1

**A/N: So, I watched 'Tsubasa' without realizing the third season had been canceled due to violence and I kind of finished that last OVA and was like, "Wait, what? No!" Tore my soul up so bad I ended up crawling to my computer and writing Elric angst. Enjoy this first installation of a two-part mini-series inspired by anime-grief.**

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Defining Moments: Maes Goes Metal Part 1

I looked at my son. His gaunt frame was lying too still on the hospital bed. It swallowed him. The blue bed sheets, the tubes, the wires, the child-sized mask, straight down to the loose gown. It was all just too big for him. It swallowed him. I'd been sensitive about my height when I was his age. I'd raged over it. That reasoning had grown more and more shameful in my mind with every passing year that Maes just didn't grow. He was twelve years old and just barely four foot three. Four foot three and currently weighing in at a grand total of fifty-two pounds. It was like his body was trying to disappear.

The nurses of the Children's Hospital in Dublith had measured him a couple months ago when we'd checked Maes in for what was supposed to have been a four-day hospitalization. We did it every year, it seemed, often more than that. Never knew when it would hit hard enough to hospitalize him, but it was still expected, to some degree. Winter was the worst. Always. No matter how warm we kept the house, no matter how many precautions we took to keep him cooped up from the cold air, how strict we were with forgoing the fireplace as to keep the indoor air clear, winter always got him.

We'd thought this trip to Dublith was like all the other times. Jumpstart his immune system with steroids. Give him enough oxygen to make a grown man dizzy. Stick a tube down his nose to pump food into his stomach when he'd get too scared of suffocating to waste a breath trying to eat. Just to get him past his usual seasonal hump of pneumonia. We hadn't even brought Sophie along this time. She'd stayed back with a friend. Maes had told her he'd be as quick as he could so she wouldn't miss him too much. Big brother had to be the only person that girl would ever admit to missing.

And then the doctors had told us. Broken the news to Winry and me at how all those years of close calls had finally caught up with our little son. We'd had to ask a favor of Teacher and Sig to bring Sophie to Dublith from Risembool. Maes had said Winry or I was free to pick her up ourselves as long as we came back. Our general reaction had been some gentler version of, 'Like hell.' He was fading from us. We weren't leaving his side.

Our initial four days had stretched into seven weeks. None of us ever brought it up that we'd technically chosen to withdraw our eleven-year-old from school without so much as a note. No one said anything about it when the hospital brought in an extra bed next to Maes's to save Winry and me from sleeping upright after the two of us had stopped paying attention to visiting hours and started spending the nights with him together. We didn't even say thanks. Didn't want to do anything to acknowledge the finiteness of something so seemingly simple as a cot, a cot that would likely not be removed until Maes was removed. We didn't talk about that, either.

Maes never mentioned when he was outstandingly uncomfortable, except to his doctors. He stopped telling us when he was feeling worse than usual as he came to realize he wasn't getting to tell us he felt better anymore. Feeling worse became just another checkpoint for feeling even worse later.

So, Maes smiled and said he was happy.

Winry had been saying the past few days, "This is it, isn't it? It's really over this time." And I'd done a fabulous job of playing the jerk and telling her to shut up about it, that we weren't giving up on him. He'd been fighting since his start in the world. We damn well weren't stopping now.

Winry had stopped fighting me. She'd taken on this present exhaustion that made her seem dead and useless when I tried to clash with her. She helped Sophie keep up with schoolwork and she stroked Maes's hair and smiled back when he told her how happy he was. Happy for no damn reason.

And I'd started to ask myself, if one soul really was worth the same as any other, could human transmutation work if I traded my life for his?

I jumped at the lukewarm touch against my hand. Maes stared up as me with his glassy golden eyes. His gaze was tarnished, clouded. It made me wonder if he'd been oxygen-deprived long enough to get delusional this time. Fevers had seemed to do the trick in the past when they'd climbed high enough. But his lips smiled weakly under the mask and his eyes brightened under their haze at the sight of me. I folded his hand into mine.

"Smile lines," he said, "are pretty."

He was telling me I needed to quit brooding. He'd caught my likely glowering expression. Smile lines are pretty. That was the verbalized ending of a train of thought that had most likely started in, 'I don't like it when Dad frowns.'

I smiled for him. "That better?"

He nodded.

"You get some good rest?" I said.

He hesitated a moment before nodding again. Poor kid hated lying. I felt bad for asking such a pointless question. Maes's attempts at rest hadn't been _good_ in weeks.

He coughed, his frail body trembling with each heave and choke of air. I looked away. I was a coward for it, but I just couldn't watch this part anymore. I closed my eyes as his bony fingers clung tighter to my thumb while his body fought to catch its breath. His grip loosened as his breathing relaxed enough for him to calm himself. Every time. Now that treatments had stopped working, Maes panicked when he lost his breath. It had never really been so up to him to catch it in the past.

"Dad," he said. "Look," he said, "at me."

I winced. His voice was commanding. He didn't speak with authority unless he was feeling like every other authority he'd depended on had proven inadequate. I looked at him and my heart sank at the paled, frightened look on his sweaty face. I'd expected maybe a little anger. No, he was just scared. I felt his hand tighten around mine.

"Don't," he said, "look," he said, "away." He rested his eyes, swallowing hard like his mouth might be dry. "If I can," he said, "be inside, then," he coughed, "you can be…"

"Outside," I finished.

Outside. If he could bear to keep fighting death from inside his sad excuse of a body, then I sure as hell could stand watching him do it from the outside. That's what he was saying. I smoothed his hair from his eyes. His bangs had gotten so long. He'd only just had a haircut before we'd checked him in.

"Dad," he said, "you have," he said, "to look."

"Okay, okay. I get it, bud. I'm looking. Don't kill yourself."

Maes's face crumpled unexpectedly and I felt my breath catch at the apparent tears threatening to brim from his eyes.

"Maes?"

"I'm not," he said, "killing myself."

"No," I said. I kept petting his hair, trying my best to keep my hand from shaking as I did so. "Of course you're not. That was a figure of speech. A really stupid figure of speech. You're okay, kiddo. You're okay."

"I'm," he said, "not okay." He sniffled. "You're not looking at me."

"Yes I…"

I trailed off. Oh. That kind of looking. The kind where you accept stuff you don't want to accept.

I kept my eyes on his eyes, not daring to waver onto his greyed skin, his bony figure pierced and synched with every tube, wire, and apparatus the doctors had been able to fit on him at once. I held my expression steady, flattening my features to keep from revealing too much.

"Maes," I said. "Don't do this to me." I shifted my gaze down to our joined hands for just a moment. "You don't know what you're asking."

His eyes widened significantly like he hadn't expected that to come out of me. I thought about taking it back, but I knew he'd see through that in a heartbeat. I waited a moment while he decided whether he was strong enough to be upset. He did a little surprising of his own and shot me a stern frown.

"You want me to," he said, "keep it to myself?"

I swallowed. Didn't want to know the extent of what that meant. He told me anyway.

"How am I," he said, "supposed to say goodbye to you if you won't," he coughed, "if you," he coughed harder.

I held his shoulder. "Take a breath."

"I don't need instruction on how to breathe!" he said. "Just let me," he coughed. "Please, Dad! Stop looking at me like I'm going to make it this time!"

I felt my body freeze. Maes shrugged my hand away, drew away from me and rolled onto his other side. His body shook and contracted at the effort of his choked coughs that sounded more and more like sobs from where I was sitting.

"Stop making Mom," he said, "stop making her cry," he said, "by herself." Now he was definitely crying. "Stop telling Sophie I'm," his voice broke, "going to be there."

Because this doesn't just affect you, Dad. That's what he was telling me. It's your job to be brave, Dad. I'm going to be gone soon and I need to know you'll get them through it. If you don't let me go, they won't be able to either.

I stood. I clenched my teeth to remind myself I couldn't raise my voice around him. My words made up for it. "How the hell would you know how hard it is to be watching from the outside?" My fists tightened, a weak attempt at calming old anger. "You really want to take care of your family? Quit wasting your energy worrying about us and live longer!"

I heard Winry's sneakers squeak on the tile and found she had just entered through the doorway. I felt my stomach flop at the look on her face. The look she was giving me. The look of horror that said she'd caught me accepting defeat.

She shook her head in what seemed to be shock. "Don't talk to him like that. No. Don't you dare take this out on him!"

I kicked my chair back and walked briskly from Maes's bedside. Winry called after me as I strode past her to the door.

"Where are you going?" she said sharply.

"I don't know," I said. "To go throw up or something. Talk to your son."

"Oh, yeah, great!" she railed as I left down the hall. "Very smooth. Perfect time to be moping, Ed! Go on and play the child! That's just great!"

"Dad?" Maes was saying from the room. "Don't go! I didn't," he said, "mean it." His quick breaths were audible from where I was in the hall. "I didn't know!"

I slowed my steps. I tried to make my legs stop walking completely. I willed them with everything I could to stop in their tracks, but they wouldn't. They kept carrying me away with every slow step. My mind screamed for me to turn around. Every muscle in my body seemed to tense with the effort. I had to go back to the room. I had to take what I'd said back. I had to tell them I hadn't accepted a damn thing.

But my legs kept moving me further and further away.

I soon found myself in the playroom, the pastel-painted haven where the terminally ill kids that could actually get out of bed read storybooks with the nurses and sat around a tiny table coloring with old crayons. Sophie had made herself right at home with the others from the beginning. The average healthy child would probably have felt uncomfortable integrating into a small crowd of dying peers. Not our Sophie. She'd grown up since birth with a dying peer for a big brother. She was almost too accustomed to sick faces and helping untangle IV's.

In the weeks she'd been here, she'd made a lot of friends. She'd been losing them too. Her reasoning had been, "I'd beat the shit out of some kid who ditched big brother just because he was temporary. I'll beat the shit out of myself if I ditch some other kid's sick brother."

I washed my hands at the sink stationed at the playroom entrance and donned a complimentary mask from the little box at the side. I hated it. More than it being uncomfortable, the mask was a tangible reminder of every moment I'd spent with one tied over the lower part of my face. I'd gotten adept at fastening the ties at the back of my head without catching my hair in the knot in the past twelve years.

"Hey, Dad," said Sophie from the coloring table. "How's bro?"

Always the first question off her tongue. I came to the table and knelt beside her. She was drawing a purple man-eating beast. Again. I got curious looks from the other kids sitting at the table. Maes was a little infamous from the few times he'd been strong enough to join the others. Of course he was. He was Maes. He'd told girls how pretty their bald heads were and boys how amputations made them look like heroes coming out of battle. He'd told them pain meant you were alive. So pain wasn't so bad. And death wasn't so bad either.

"He's," I said, "having some Mom time."

Sophie smiled. "So, he's awake?"

"Yeah," I said. "He's with Mom, though. Give them a moment."

Her expression fell a little. "Oh. That kind of Mom time."

I watched her reach for the orange crayon. I new what came next. She scribbled some flames blazing from her purple monster's mouth. I couldn't help but wonder sometimes if these purple monsters were fictional creatures, or self-portraits.

"I want some Sophie time," she said with her eyes on the page. One of her flames engulfed a tall stick figure fleeing on the ground. "When he's awake. Got it?"

I gulped. "Sure, sweet stuff. You'll get your turn."

"Sophie?" said the girl across from us.

"What is it," she said, "sweet stuff?"

The girl pointed her frail finger at the stick figure swallowed in monster-fire. "That your daddy again?"

My neck stiffened.

"Sure is," said Sophie. "Good catch, Mary."

Mary smiled excitedly. "Thanks!"

"That's Daddy, huh?" I asked. "Mary said,_ 'Again_,' Soph?"

"You're a frequently appearing character, Mr. Elric," informed a little boy. "We been following your story all week."

"All week," I said, "Soph?"

"Why, yes," said Sophie. "Problem, Daddy?"

She reached for the black and started drawing ashes over the figure's stick-arms—apparently _my_ stick arms.

I stood. "Okay, baby girl. Time to go."

Sophie folded her paper twice and shoved it down the front of her shirt like a hooker tucking away money. Now where'd she learn to do that? She grabbed my hand roughly to pull herself to her feet. She released me, throwing my arm away from her as she walked out of the room ahead of me.

"See you later, guys," she said.

I hurried after her. I wasn't sure if she meant for me to keep up or if she just wanted to storm off. I didn't ask. I wasn't interested in keeping in her good graces. I'd obviously lost those.

She stopped in the empty hospital chapel and turned to face me with her arms crossed. Yeah, great. She had definitely planned on me following. Why else would she have picked some goddamned chapel as her destination? She knew just how to tweak me.

"You're angry," I said.

"Yeah, what tipped you off?"

I decided to take her literally. "Most kids don't make a habit of drawing a week-long series of their father being burned alive by a monster."

"Oh, don't worry." She checked her fingernails with disturbing nonchalance. "It's never the same way twice. You've been starved, decapitated, impaled…"

My hand grabbed the left side of my stomach like a reflex.

"What's wrong with your face?" she said with a frightening scowl.

"Could ask you the same thing, girlie."

Technically, I was a survivor of all those things. It made me uneasy, her listing them. Sophie's frown deepened.

"Quit feeling sorry for yourself!" she said. "You're ugly as hell. It pisses me off!"

"You going to tell me what this is about?" Because now really isn't a good time for me and I need you to say what you have to say so I can go.

"Bastard!" she shouted. "You lied to me!"

I took a sharp breath.

She balled her small fists. "You said he'd be fine!"

My feet threatened to back away. She stepped forward, less than a foot from me. Her hands clutched my shirt and yanked to shake me. It was unexpected enough to jerk me like whiplash. My girl had always been a lot stronger than she looked with her blonde pigtails and purple shoes.

"Sophie," I said. My voice sounded so small it was enough to scare me.

"Shut up!" she said. "Shut up, shut up, shut up! You said he'd get better! You said!"

"I…"

"I hate you!" she screamed. "I wish you'd die! I wish it was you instead! You bastard! You terrible, ugly, rotten father! I hate you!"

I stumbled back, eyes burning. It took me a moment to realize my hands were shaking. After that, I realized my knees had started shaking too.

"I'm sorry, " I said. "I didn't…"

"Mom told me," said Sophie. "She said you're too scared to do anything about it, so you're just playing dead."

"To do anything," I said, "about it?"

But what the hell was there to do? Had Winry meant I was too scared to accept it? Because that hadn't seemed to make her very happy when I'd done it just a moment ago.

I took a calming breath. "You ever hear that phrase, be careful what you wish for?"

Something in Sophie's face told me she'd just seen something new in mine, something she found unsettling. Her big blue eyes, wide and threatening tears she refused to shed. Her body shaking with panting breaths, panting like her brother did. Her mouth moved to speak. It was too much.

"Sorry, baby girl," I said. "Not now."

I left her there faster than her shorter legs could've kept pace with if she'd actually followed me. I'd known she'd probably be too proud to do that, though. She was too much like me. Everyone said that.

I made it into the men's room and soon found myself hunched and retching over a sink. I gripped the porcelain sides and willed my stomach muscles to stop contracting. The more I thought about it, though, the more violently my stomach clenched. I gritted my teeth in time to catch and swallow down hot bile as it splashed over my tongue. I breathed heavy through my nose.

I felt a hand on my shoulder and shot my gaze up to see some random guy standing next to me with concern and pity written all over his face.

"Bad prognosis?" he said. "Or did you just get the dreaded life-expectancy report?"

I shivered. Was he talking to me like…a regular? Some kind of frequent customer? For a few excruciating seconds, it took all I had not to punch him out. The urge must've show in my expression or body language, because the guy took his hand off my back and stepped off.

"Sorry," he said. "Didn't mean to pry."

I passed him in rigid silence. Turned out the hall was safer than the bathroom. My legs picked up pace until I was practically running, and I didn't really try to figure out why. It wasn't like anyone was bothering to go after me. I forgot faces the moment I'd passed them, let concerned greetings from hospital staff leave my mind before I'd processed the words. This wasn't right. This wasn't…

Happening.

I doubled over and panted in the bright light of the afternoon sun. Blinding. How'd it manage to stay so bright with a winter so cold? I shuffled back a couple steps and plunked down onto one of the outdoor benches where discharged patients sat with their families while waiting for cabs. I must've sat on that bench with Maes a hundred times. Same one since he was twenty-three months old, his first hospitalization. It had been just a few months after his Sophie had been born and he'd panicked because they wouldn't let us bring such a young baby to visit him.

'My Sophie! My Sophie!' he'd said. 'Where is my Sophie?'

"Damn it," I said, face sinking into my palm. "No. This isn't happening."

"Yes, Ed," said Winry from behind. "It is."

I looked up. She was standing a few feet from the bench with a kind of tight disapproval to her mouth that said she was denying me closeness on purpose. She came around a bit and stood still, feet planted, arms folded with her hands hugging her elbows. She'd come out without a coat. Same as me.

"You're really going to do this?" she said acidly. "After all this time, you've decided to take it out on the children?"

I laughed bitterly. "Decided?"

Winry didn't miss a beat. "Yes, Ed. Decided."

"Not now, Winry."

"That's what you said to Sophie."

I straightened. "You heard?"

"She told me!" Winry scowled. "I was on my way down to check on you two and I found her sobbing outside the chapel. She's in with her brother now showing him a doodle of Daddy being burned alive by a purple dragon! This attitude has to end, Ed. Right now! Maes's health isn't going to wait for you to get a grip!"

I felt my jaw tightening. Thirty minutes. Thirty simple minutes. Fifteen, even. Was that really too much to ask of them before I got accused of wasting time?

I shifted in my seat to face her better. "Look, what do you want from me? A week ago you were asking me to accept reality. What is this now? You asking me to accept it with cheer? Make up your mind!"

She all but stomped her foot. "I'm asking you to be an adult! For them, Ed. They _need_ an adult."

"And you're pinning that on me? Jeez! I'm not the one grieving my eyes out right in front of him, Winry. Take a look at yourself before you start lecturing me on being the adult."

I caught a slight shudder run through her at the end of my words, but her anger seemed to force composure over her. She looked toward the hospital building and let out a harsh breath.

"I swear," she said. "You're going to look back on this in a few years and wonder why the hell you were so—"

I stood. "I'm sorry, did you say _in a few years_?" My fists clenched until my fingers hurt. "Because it sounded like you did."

"Yeah? What about it?" The sudden nervousness in her face told me she knew full well _what about it_.

My eyes narrowed at her. "You're talking about…when he's gone?" My fists clenched harder and were soon shaking at my sides. "You're talking about that?"

We didn't talk about days past Maes's existence. Never mentioned a future without him in it.

My fists loosened. I exhaled. "Sorry, Winry. That's a kind of moving forward I can't talk about right now." I dropped back down onto the bench and let my face return to my hands. "My son just told me to let him die." I looked up at her through my fingers. "Pardon me while I prepare myself to tell him I can do that."

Winry shook. I held my breath. She visibly shook! I stood. She looked unsteady on her feet. Her eyes were wet enough to tear and I knew she was losing it. I took a step, ready to put my hand out to her. She backed away.

"Fine!" she said. "Stay here and pout!"

"Pout?" I bristled.

She backed away another couple steps more like abandonment than a retreat. Her teeth gritted as she spoke. "Go on. Go ahead and tell him he can die. Because that's obviously what we were going for when we checked him into this place."

She was being…sarcastic?

"What the hell are you trying to…?" I trailed off and swallowed. Now I was shaking. "Dammit, Winry! What the hell do you want from me?"

"I want my baby to live!" Her face tilted down, tears sliding down her cheeks and off her chin. "You bonded Al's soul to armor! You pulled his body out of the Portal! You freed an entire country from a Philosopher's Stone on the Promised Day! You saved your own life healing a wound with your life force!"

She looked up at me with a familiar kind of desperation that sent a sick feeling down to the pit of my stomach. Her eyes. Wide, brimming with horrified tears. It was the same face she'd worn the first time she'd met Scar.

"Please, Ed!" she cried. "There has to be something you can do for him! I know Al said_ he_ can't, but if you," she sobbed. "If you just surpassed Equivalent Exchange and got your alchemy back like you said you would, I know you could save him!"

My stomach clenched. There it was. The inevitable. Someone was finally asking me to make it all better with alchemy.

"Why?" I shook my head. "Of all people? Why'd you have to be the one to…?"

"Ed, please!"

The pleading in her voice made me light-headed. I looked down at my hands in front of me. They were shaking. Like dry leaves. My throat felt like it was becoming tighter, breath by breath.

"Ed!" she cried.

"I can't," I said. My voice trembled. "I'm useless."

* * *

**Yep. I'd imagined this scene so much more detailed and vivid than Sophie's retelling to Nina in FL. Finally get to write it out! Yay!**

**As far as replies to reviews go for 'Roybecca,' since this fic is supposed to be my writer's block dump with no stress attached, I'll just PM back to your reviews instead of posting my responses each update. I tend to write way long PMs, but it gives me more freedom in some areas, so I'll take my chances.**


	3. Maes Goes Metal: Part 2

**A/N: Um, so this was just getting way too long, so it's gonna be a three-part miniseries instead of two. Here ya go. Part 2/3.**

* * *

Defining Moments: Maes Goes Metal Part Two

Maes had a fever again. No surprise. Still, the little guy insisted on staying awake all morning to listen to me read. Somehow he ended up diverging me from a book on advanced alchemy he'd already memorized to personal stories from my past. He just couldn't seem to get enough of those, no matter how many times I told him. That's what he wanted from people who visited. He wanted stories about what it was like to be well enough to go out and do things.

"And so," I continued, fingering the closed alchemy book on my lap, "that bastard decided to snap his fingers and wipe out every one of the soul-powered dummies in one spiraled flame, quick and easy. Before I had time to question it, that freak, Envy, came out into the open and started his own conversation with Mustang." I rolled my shoulders back and yawned. "And you know what stemmed from that."

Maes smiled faintly up at me. "You really," said Maes, "like him."

"Mustang?" I snorted. "No, buddy. I'd tell you what I really thought about that idiot bastard, but Winry would get on my case about your young ears."

"Then why," Maes smiled bigger, "do you like to stop the story right before parts he wouldn't be proud of?"

I swallowed. "It was a good stopping place. What that jerk's proud of makes no difference to me. You need your rest. That's all." I felt my cheeks warm at his lingering smile. "Sleep, bud. That's enough for now."

"Tell me about," he said, "Mustang's daughter."

I let out a sigh. "Again, bud?"

He nodded.

I looked away. I hated this, how he always brought the Mustang's into everything. It wasn't fair. No matter how hard I tried to push them out of mind, Maes clung like they were family. He called Mustang his uncle same as he did Al. Even after I'd finally admitted to Maes that the sole reason we'd turned our backs on that family was because of how they'd felt toward him, he still held on. He'd smiled and asked for another story.

"First time I saw her was at the wedding," I said, "and I thought I might be seeing a ghost. She was so small she could've blown away like dry petals. Here I'd been told she'd just turned three and she was the size of a baby. She was a baby. She was calling Mustang, 'Daddy,' and my first instinct was to throw up, to be honest. I'll admit, I ignored them as best as I could while they were there. I had better things to do than catch up with my former commanding officer and his family. Made me sick, though, how Nina seemed scared of every other person there but her adoptive parents."

"You were jealous," said Maes with a sly grin.

"I was not," I said. "Like I said; I had better things to do than kiss up to some other guy's kid."

"Didn't mean," said Maes, "Mustang." He coughed. "You were jealous of Nina, Daddy."

My face slackened.

"Dad?" he said.

"Yeah, bud?"

"He was there when I was born." He rested his eyes and breathed. "Now he's not. It's okay to miss him."

"I don't…"

Maes opened his glassy eyes and stared at me. I paused. I sighed.

"Let's talk about something else," I said.

Since yesterday's family outbursts, all of us had made some kind of unspoken decision to keep our fatalistic comments to ourselves. This started up just in time to keep Maes calm through an evening fever that stretched into the next day. Just in time to keep me from tearing my hair out, too.

"Know what would be," said Maes, "amazing?"

"Amazing?" I said. "What?"

"If I got to," he said, "see Aunt Mei's baby."

"Babies," I said with a smile. "I talked to Al this morning before you woke up. Doc says it looks like Mei's having twins. Sophie doesn't know yet."

Maes took a breath. "Twins?" He smiled shakily and began to sniffle. "Really?"

"Yeah." I put my hand on his hot forehead and stroked his sweaty hair from his eyes. "Yeah, kiddo. How about that?"

"How long," he said, "until they're here?"

"Well," I said. I swallowed the quiver building in me. He was comparing his life expectancy to his cousins' due date. "It's going to be a while, but you never know. It could be sooner than the doctor's original guess. Al said multiples tend to come earlier, so there's no telling."

I made myself hold Maes's weak gaze. It was almost painful. Tears were streaming down his face as he fought to keep the smile.

"I hope they come," he said, "right on time."

I shivered at his words. My hand found his and my fingers coiled around his limp grip. "Right on time. That's just what you'd say, isn't it?"

"Early's not so great, Dad," he said with a gentle smile. He closed his eyes and I watched his brow crinkle and mouth tighten as he tried to suppress a sob. Tears ran down his cheeks and he lost it for a moment, taking in a sobbing breath and coughing hard on it.

I touched his arm and waited, tried not to cave into the building ache behind my eyes. There didn't seem to be anything worth saying. Maes shuddered and coughed, every moment of peace being quickly interrupted by another wave of sobs. My whole body felt weak suddenly at the realization that I knew exactly what to say.

"I'll tell them about you," I said. I took a sharp breath as the first touches of warmth trickled down my cheeks. "Even if you're not there, your cousins are going to know you, kiddo. They're going to know their cousin Maes. I'll make sure of it."

Maes stared up at me, wide eyed with faltered breaths. His face sank into something relieved enough to sting and he hiccupped on his tears.

"Daddy," he said. "You're looking at me."

I bowed my head, cradling his tiny hand to my cheek. "Yeah, and it sucks."

His bony knuckles smudged at fresh tears as I pressed his hand to my skin and he seemed affected by the tangible evidence that his father had been crying. He forced a smile and tightened his fingers around my grip.

"I'm happy," he said. His catchphrase.

"Are you really?" I said. I breathed. "Are you really happy, Maes?"

He looked away, blinking rapidly. "Let's talk," he said, "about something else."

"Yeah," I said. I smiled feebly. "Sounds good."

Maes coughed. It was a dry, hoarse sound that made my throat hurt just hearing it. His chest rattled with a congested breath and he rolled on his side toward me with a sniffle.

"I'd really like," he said, "to get out of bed sometime." He coughed. "Maybe go outside?"

"I bet you would," I said. "It's been a while, huh?"

He smiled distantly. "Fifty-four days," he said, "eight hours, and," his eyes shifted to the wall clock, "seventeen minutes." He looked back at me dully. He looked away, suddenly. He seemed to be in near embarrassment, like it had occurred to him that I hadn't been asking for the exact time-length. He muttered, "Give or take thirty-two seconds."

I laughed. "I'll take your word for it." I rubbed his hair. Like silky down feathers, warm and damp with sweat. "Hey, kiddo, how old's your sister?"

Maes looked up at me slowly. He swallowed. "Nine years, ten months, fifteen days," he breathed, "two hours, and," he looked at the clock, "four-point-two minutes."

"How much milk have you consumed as opposed to Sophie?"

His brow knit. "Including breast feeding?"

"No."

"In total?" he said. "Or average yearly intake?"

"Let's go for in total."

Maes didn't even pause to mull it over. "Me, thirty-three fluid ounces." He grinned. "Sophie, two and a half." He coughed and giggled. "Mom snuck it in her hot chocolate for a week, but Sophie figured it out."

I sighed. "That's my girl."

Maes nodded, still smiling.

I patted his head. "That's your Sophie."

Maes nodded.

"Jeez," I said. "And that was your grand totals in a lifetime? No wonder your mom gets on my case about being a bad example."

Maes shook his head. "Dairy exacerbates pulmonary congestion." He rested his eyes and sighed. "Sophie grew out of not liking it a long time ago." He breathed. "She still won't drink it, though. She wants to," he breathed, "be like you."

"Does she?" I chuckled. I paused at stroking his hair. I felt my face sink. "No, she wants to be like big brother."

Maes opened his eyes to me. For a while, he just stared blankly into my gaze like there was something interesting there. He took a breath. "Big brother wants to be like you."

I felt my shoulders tighten. It wasn't a negative feeling, not a disturbed kind of tension. It was more the result of surprise. I shouldn't have felt surprise. Maes had told me with his own mouth plenty of times since he could talk that he wanted to be like Daddy when he grew up. But this time he was saying it a little differently. He wasn't referring to being like me someday, because it had become apparent that he wasn't going to make it to adulthood. He was speaking in present tense. He wanted to be like me. He was searching for affirmation this time.

That he'd already made it to that point.

"Come on, buddy," I said with all the smile I could manage. "You've always been like me." I laughed. "All the parts I'm proud of, at least."

His glassy, feverish gaze seemed to clear for a moment, like clouds parting to show a beam of sunlight. He bunched his hand around a portion of his pillowcase and smiled to himself.

"Okay." He closed his eyes. "If you say so, I believe you."

I took a breath. That's all it took? If I said so? I patted his bony back. He was saying it all with his body language. He was ready to sleep now.

"All right, kiddo," I said. I took his arm and helped ease him onto his back. "Don't go falling asleep on your side again. You'll be waking up coughing in less than ten minutes if you don't keep yourself elevated."

He grumbled a little as I shifted his stacked pillows under him to get him back to almost upright. Not the most comfortable position to sleep in, but if it helped him breath, what could you do? Maes snuggled under the covers as I tucked them up over his shoulders. It was almost too sad. The moment he decided to give up the fight to stay awake, sleep came out of nowhere.

No, it wasn't sad. It was frightening.

"Hey," I said softly. "I'll call Al this week. See if he can make a stop this way soon. There might be something he can do for you with alkehestry to get you feeling well enough to get out of bed and go outside like we talked about."

"Mm," Maes grunted in agreement. He swallowed. "Sounds nice."

I patted his hair one last time. He was drifting off fast.

"Go ahead and rest," I said. "I'll be here."

"Mm," he said. "Dad?"

"Yeah, bud?"

"Remember that almanac," he said, "on Grandma's coffee table?"

I wrinkled my brow. "Huh?"

"Statistics," he said, "taken from a census." He swallowed. "I read it before dinner a few years ago."

"Um, okay?" The things this kid remembered.

"Divorce rates," he muttered. My jaw tightened like a reflex. Maes continued softly. "In Amestris. Eighty to ninety percent likelihood," he said, "of divorce for parents who," he said, "lose a child."

His eyes opened to thin slits for a moment like he wanted to say more, but his exhaustion overcame him and he ended the conversation with a garbled sound and a long, sleepy sigh. I sank in my chair. Well, that was a pleasant note to leave me on. This was the kind of crap he'd been so angry with me wanting him to keep to himself? Guess his anger was justified. This was some pretty heavy stuff for a kid to be dealing with by himself.

I chuckled into my hand. A kid.

"Something funny?" Winry said softly from the doorway.

I looked up. She crossed the room to me. She was wearing the same jeans and long-sleeved cotton shirt she'd been wearing the day before. Neither of us had really been much for keeping up appearances with Maes as bad as he was.

Winry seated herself at the edge of his bed and watched him sleep with a dull sadness to her eyes.

"What were you laughing about?" she said. Her voice told me she wasn't in the mood to deal with me and she was probably just fishing for a reason to get angry with me.

I hunched. "It's nothing."

"Tell me."

I rolled my eyes. "It's nothing. Really. I just," I paused. "I was thinking about how much Maes is going through for such a little kid."

Winry frowned in disgust. "And that's funny?"

"It's hilarious," I said. "That I'd think about it in those terms."

"You think so?"

I laughed to myself. "Yes. I was an orphaned amputee with a brother depending on me and the military set on using me as a human weapon. If some thirty-three year old bastard had come up to me and told me I was going through a lot for such a 'little kid,' I would've knocked him out."

Winry blinked.

I turned away. "It's funny. I'm not one to feel sorry for myself. It gets in the way. But now that I am, it's because I'm watching him go through too much. When I was his age, I didn't seem to give a damn about me." I shook my head. "It took my son getting hurt for me to realize how selfish I was to get angry at people for asking me to be more careful."

Winry snorted bitterly. "You have a strange definition of funny."

She was baiting me. No surprise. I looked at my hands and changed the subject as cleanly as I could.

"How's Sophie?" I asked.

Winry prefaced her answer with, "She doesn't want to see you."

"Understandable," I said.

Winry shot me a quick look like she'd expected me to say something different. "Well," she said. "Sig decided she needed an ice cream cone and Sophie decided it was a good idea as soon as one of the nurses said no one eats ice cream in the winter, so the Curtis's are sugaring her up right now."

"Perfect," I said. "Sig has a calming personality. I guess Teacher does too when she wants to."

Winry watched Maes in tense silence. Things hadn't been the same between the two of us since I'd told her yesterday there was no way for me to help Maes—not even with alchemy. For days, Winry had been this perfectly unreactive presence with me. Then she'd asked me to fix Maes and, given my answer, it was like we'd switched places. Now I was avoiding fights and she was starting them.

"Do you think we'll get divorced?" I said.

Winry whipped her gaze up to meet mine, eyes sharp like knives. "What?"

I held her stare. "Most couples do after losing a child."

Winry looked away, glaring. "What are you saying, Edward?"

I gulped. This glare of hers and this cold tone in her voice weren't new to me. For years, we'd been shifting back and forth from growing closer to growing apart. All it really amounted to wasn't how we felt about each other. It was whether we had it in us at any given time to care about someone else besides ourselves. It was whether we had the emotional reserves to put each other first; or even third! Sometimes I wondered if Winry pulled out that specific glare just to make it known how unforgiveable it was that I'd stopped being there for her. We'd agreed from the beginning that marrying each other didn't amount to being perfect for each other.

"I just…" I hunched my shoulders. "I don't see this getting better anytime soon. It's only going to get worse, Winry, and that's a fact."

Her expression hardened. It was like she was putting on a protective mask. "Is that what you want? When this is over, you want us to," she couldn't seem to keep eye contact as she said, "divorce each other?"

_What I want?_

I sat up straight like a reflex. "No! That's pretty much the last thing I need! But that's not completely up to me, is it?"

I looked down at my lap, shoulders hunched to my ears. No, that wasn't up to me at all. Sophie had already taken Winry's side and mothers always got full custody, didn't they? The house was Winry's, too. There wouldn't be a single thing left for me in Risembool. Al was in Xing starting his own family, teaching a science there that I couldn't perform anymore. I'd broken ties with Mustang and most any mutual friends that would've continued to connect us. Rush Valley was Winry's territory. Ling talked about my family eventually moving to Xing so we'd be closer, but it was joking around in the end. Teacher and Sig were the kind of people you visited. Anything more would've been a burden on them. I'd be a mess with Maes dead and the rest of my family gone. I'd be more an obligation than a guest, no matter where I ended up.

There'd be nowhere on the planet left for me to fall into.

If Winry left me, I'd lose everything. The realization sent my heart pounding. I'd lose my hometown. I'd lose everything Maes had touched. I'd lose my remaining child. I'd lose the life I'd spent thirty-three years shaping.

No. I'd lose the life Winry and I had spent thirty-three years shaping together. I'd lose _her_. I'd lose my wife, the mother of my children. She was my best friend, my grieving partner, my comforter after bad dreams and smiling face after good ones. She was the woman who'd been stealing the covers off me every single night since the first time we'd slept side by side. She was the one who knew all the things that made me laugh that I hadn't told anyone else I found funny and she was the one who looked over at me and smiled when she knew I was trying not to laugh. My partner in crime. My gear-head, loser mechanic. My comrade from life's battlefield. Dammit! Wasn't losing Maes enough? No, it was never enough. Things could always be worse.

I jolted in my skin at Winry's cool fingertips brushing the tops of my fists where I had them clenched against my knees. I watched in rigid silence as her gentle hands curled over mine and helped me loosen my shaking fists. She laced her fingers with mine until my body had slackened enough for me to consciously grip onto her. I felt her tears splash against my hands as she bowed her head over our joined hold.

"Is that what you think?" Her breath trembled. "You think this is going to beat us?"

"I'd rather it didn't."

"Then it won't," she said.

"This is," I said, "the first time you've touched me in two weeks, Winry."

Her hands clenched tightly around mine with a grip like steel.

"Sorry," I said. "This is a lousy time to be bringing this up."

Her head sank against the crook of my neck and I felt her tears dampening the collar of my shirt. My heart skipped.

"I love you," she whispered. Her body shuddered with a sob. She swung her arms around my neck and hugged tight. "I love you so much."

I wrapped my thick arms around her cottony waist and pulled her onto my lap. She held me back and I let her cry into my shoulder for a while.

"I'm sorry," she said.

I shook my head and rubbed between her trembling shoulders.

_There we go, Maes. Mommy's not crying alone this time._

"I love you, Winry," I said. I took a breath. "I'm sorry too."

I felt her spindly hands clinging to the back of my shirt and a shiver ran through me.

"I'm so sorry, Winry. For everything."

…

Maes took a turn for the worse that evening. Honestly, it had probably been that bad for hours, but it wasn't until evening that he stopped being able to hide it from the nurses. One of them caught him coughing up just enough blood to stain the crook of his arm and that was it. Winry and I were banished from his room for the night. Apparently he'd been pushing himself to stay awake as long as we were around. He'd sleep if he was bored; that was the hospital staff's reasoning. Maes's life wasn't boring enough with Mom, Dad, and Sophie on the scene.

He was too weak by then to put up much of a fight when Winry and I said goodbye for the night. Things were different for him when we returned the following morning, though.

…

"So, let me get this straight," Sophie said with her arms folded at me. "The doctors are worried about Maes getting overexcited, so they're keeping me back?"

"For now," I said.

She tugged at the mask on her face. "And they're letting _you_ in?"

"Um," I said, "yeah."

She raised her eyebrows. "You?"

"Yeah, Sophie."

"Okay." Her eyes rolled as she turned toward the door to the pediatric terminal ward's playroom. "Good God. Like you've been such a calming presence? Just don't make him cry this time, bastard."

If it were possible for an eleven-year-old child to kill a man's soul with words, Sophie was that child. I watched her back disappear as she passed through the door and shut me out.

"See you later, kiddo," I muttered.

I turned back into the hall. Winry was already in with Maes. For some reason she'd thought it was a good idea to have me be the one to drop our daughter off at the playroom. Now that I thought about it, knowing Winry, that had probably been her attempt at getting Sophie and me to make up with each other. Winry was like that. Couldn't take conflict in the family and meddled until everyone was getting along again. Maes was just as bad as she was. Maybe more.

I came into Maes's room with laughter thick in the air. It wasn't chuckles of amusement like someone had told a good joke or made a witty statement. It was full laughs and they were coming from my wife.

Winry looked up at me from her seat at the edge of Maes's bed with tears wet on her cheeks. The way she was laughing suggested hysteria, but Maes was next to her with a wide smile on his face to match hers. So the tears were tears of joy.

I froze. "Did the doctor say something good?"

That would've been a miracle.

Winry shook her head, blinking tickled tears down her face. "No, Ed. No. Come over here. You're not going to believe this. Come look what your son did."

I watched Maes's eyes as I walked to his bedside. His excitement was unwavering. The fevered haze was pulsing with life underneath. His little body was still weighed down by weakness across the mattress, but his smile had energy. If I hadn't know he was being so still because he couldn't pick himself up on his own, his expression might've tricked me into thinking he'd gained strength overnight.

Maes had a piece of paper turned over on his lap, I noticed. There was a grey crayon in his fist and a blue one and green one resting in the wrinkles of his blanket. I sat in the chair pulled up to his bed so he and I and his mother were close and I leaned forward so he wouldn't have to speak very loudly for me to hear.

"So," I said. "You drew me a picture?"

Maes laughed, his breaths rattling in his chest. "Sophie took care of," he said, "that. Remember?"

I glanced at his pillow. It didn't look right. There was something stuffed underneath. I pointed to it. "What's that, bud? A book?"

"Doctor lent it to me," he said. "While ago. Hid it," he said, "so he wouldn't take it away."

I raised an eyebrow. "Sneaky. What is it?"

"Anatomy," said Winry. "Go on, Maes. Show him."

Maes turned over the paper on his lap and lifted it up a couple inches for me to take. I grabbed it before he could lift it more. His arms were shaking. I wondered how long he'd been wasting his strength coloring.

I looked down at the paper. I felt my jaw loosen and I couldn't help but gape.

"This is," I said, "automail."

It was a blueprint. I'd seen plenty go through Winry's hands, for me or for other customers. Hers, of course, were done on professional paper with pencil and pen using rulers and compasses for precision. This 'blueprint' in front of me was a waxy diagram drawn in colored crayon with lines varying in shade and thickness based on where Maes's hands had gotten tired. I could see squiggles in a couple places where he'd probably lifted his crayon too late during a cough.

Still.

It was incredible. As imperfect and raw as it was, its complexity was stunning. I wasn't the automail specialist in the family, but as Winry's personal guinea pig, I knew a master's work when I saw it. Only problem I saw with it was…

"This is," I said, "for your lungs."

Maes was trying not to look fazed by the fact. "Yeah, Dad."

"It'll work, Ed," said Winry. "It's what we've been looking for. All that damage over the years, this'll fix it. It's going to breath for him. He'll be able to speak in full sentences again!"

I looked away from her hope filled eyes. Maes hadn't spoken without effort since he was two years old.

I set the paper down and forced a smile. "This is incredible."

"No more machines," said Winry. "No more hospital visits. Just maintenance and tune-ups! We can go home and Maes can go back to school with Sophie and keep her out of trouble. We can start traveling, just like we talked about when he was a baby. I can take him to Rush Valley and show him off to Mr. Garfiel and all my old customers." She took a sobbing breath. "He'll get to be a teenager, Ed!"

I nodded. "Yeah. That's…really something. Um, mind telling me how it works?"

Winry's excitement had her talking without giving Maes any openings, which was good. He seemed to be the only one between the two of them who realized my skepticism. I didn't want him pointing it out, not when she was so willing to accept this blind hope.

Winry pointed to aspects of the blueprint on my lap. Couldn't lie. The thing looked like a mechanical spider.

"The base will be classic steel," she said. She touched Maes's chest where his ribs met in the center. "We'll position the claws just so to flex the cartilage of his ribcage to encourage deeper breaths, then the tips of the claws with be dulled smooth and installed with safety-filters so they can be positioned at the base of his lungs to make up for the loss of elasticity during exhales. We'll be lining the openings for the tips to pass through, of course, to prevent wear and scarring over time."

I nodded. "And it'll expand and contract? Just like his breathing?"

Winry dried an eye. "Just like breathing." She looked at Maes. "Right, honey?"

Now he was the one forcing a smile. "Right, Mom."

How the hell had he gotten her to agree to this? I touched her hand. "Winry, there's still something I'm not sure about."

Her smile fell a little. "What is it?"

"Well," I said. Maes caught my eye and shook his head sternly. I looked back at Winry and sighed. "Well, don't you think it'll be a little…painful? For him? I mean, I know I was about the same age when I had my surgery, but this is different, isn't it? The way it's drawn, the way you described it, it looks like it goes inside him. Automail's always been used for prosthetics, as far as I know. Using it for internal organs…I'm not so sure. You think he'll be okay, living the rest of his life like that?"

Winry looked hurt. "Well, it's better than no life at all, right?" She touched Maes's hair. "Don't worry, Ed. Have him explain it to you. He says there are things Al and Mei can do with alkehestry to make it easier on him. And since breathing is involuntary, he won't need the same rehabilitation an amputee has to go through. He'll probably recover even faster than you did. It's a lot simpler than it sounds once the automail is built. I just have to build it. Then we'll take him home and get it installed and he'll be fine."

"Oh," I said. "Oh, good. I was worried." I squeezed her hand. "Listen, Winry, do you think you could give me and Maes a minute? I want to talk about the alchemy behind this."

Winry paused. "Um, okay. Yeah, you two do that. I need to make some calls. Some of these materials need to be custom ordered." She put her hand out to me and I passed her the blueprint. "If you don't think you'll need it."

"No, we're fine," I said. "Go on. I've got it from here."

She stood with a smile and leaned down to kiss Maes's warm forehead before kissing mine. She left and Maes and I watched her go in tense silence.

"Damn it," I whispered. "You're in deep, buddy."

"It'll work," he said.

"It'll hurt." I couldn't help but frown. "You lied to her about that part. And you left something important out."

Maes looked away.

"You're not going to make it through the surgery, Maes." I took his hand gently. "Take it from someone who knows."

He sniffled. "I might."

"But you'll still be sick," I said. "Even if the automail is a perfect success, you'll still be sick. Getting better oxygen won't fix your immune system. Your lungs aren't the only things killing you right now. It's been like this too long."

Maes's face crumpled. "Please don't say that."

I shook my head. "Why are you doing this? You know I'm right. I know you've thought through all of this better than I ever could. Tell me, kiddo. Why'd you show your mom something that won't work? Why'd you lie to her? What are you thinking?"

"You won't," he said, "like it."

I didn't like the sound of that. "Tell me."

He looked up at me, tears trickling from the corners of his eyes. "Don't yell at me, okay?"

I really didn't like the sound of that. Since when did I yell at him? "Okay."

"It's not as bad," he said, "as it sounds."

"Just tell me."

"I'm going to cut my life force in half," he blurted. "And I'm going to," he coughed, "use it to make me strong enough for…"

"Stop," I said. Maes watched me warily as I fought that yell he'd warned about. "No, Maes. No, you're not."

"It's the only way," he said. "I checked."

By saying he'd checked, Maes was actually implying he'd looked at every angle possible on heaven and earth and this was literally his last resort to dying. My skin bristled.

"I figured out," he said, "the matrix. Just," he coughed, "just look. It can work."

"Maes…" I said.

"Dad, just listen."

"Tell me when. When did you start looking into Human Transmutation?"

Maes's eyes noticeably widened. He pulled his gaze away. He wasn't stunned. He just knew he was in trouble. "I wasn't…"

"Then what do you think you were looking into?" I leaned over him and pulled his chin to face me. "That's what this is, Maes. Cutting into your own lifespan? That's the same field as Human Transmutation. That's how I new how to do it in Baschool. That's where you're getting this from, right? From what I did in Baschool?"

Maes shivered. His voice came out so small it sent needles down my spine. "Yes."

I clenched my teeth. His eyes. He looked shattered. Like I'd ruined it. Like I'd destroyed him. Like it was about to be my fault. No. It already was. To all of them.

"You need to stop and think," I said. "You're a smart kid, Maes, but there are going to be things you can't do."

"Dad," he said. His eyes were hard. "I'm a certifiable genius."

I tried not to look affected. This was a card he'd never played before. "Doesn't make a difference, Maes."

"Been studying this since I," he coughed, "could talk." His mouth turned down as he caught his breath. "I can do this without…"

"Without going through the Portal first?" I shook my head. "Yeah, okay, you're smart, but not that smart. You think I could've done what I did in Baschool without seeing the Truth first? No, I-"

"I don't need it."

"Yes, you do."

"Don't."

"Maes!"

He turned his face to me and glared. "So, you let me die 'cause you don't want to be outdone?"

I leaned away from him like his presence burned. "You think that's it? You think I'd be willing to sacrifice your life for the sake of my pride? Dammit, Maes! I shaved years off my lifespan to close one wound long enough to get me to a doctor where I spent months recovering the rest of the way. I used years, Maes, and I still barely made it. I'm telling you right now. You can transmute elements like nothing I've ever seen, but you have no idea what playing with souls entails. If there's one thing I know, someone always gets hurt and it's never what you had in mind."

"I'll take what I can get!"

"That's your problem!" I said. "You think you stand a chance of getting something out of this! Just what life force do you plan on cutting in half, exactly? You're less than a month from dead already. This isn't regenerating cells to close a wound. This is trying to fold your health in half to make it thicker without taking into account that it still won't be enough. I'm going to tell you exactly what's going to happen, okay? You're going to rush into this transmutation because you're out of time. You're going to give up scraps of what lifespan you have left to gain scraps of strength. You're going to feel better for about thirty seconds."

He lifted his frail hands to cover his ears. "Stop!"

It felt like I was being battered by a hard current right up to the top of my head, jagged rocks slicing against me like everything around me and in the fibers of my muscles were screaming at me to go a different way. I'd felt it before. Smaller doses, but I'd known this feeling for a long time. It was the feeling of the bearer of bad news, as Winry and I had come to call it. We'd decided together from the beginning that we'd be honest with our kids. We'd tell the hard truth like it was when they needed to hear it. The terror in Maes's face told me this wasn't the time for it. The glint in his hard eyes told me he needed it and he needed it now.

"It'll last for thirty seconds, Maes." I stood over him. "Then that strength you paid for is going to wear off. You're going to stop feeling better. Your body's going to search for the reserves you've been fighting to hold onto for weeks, but those reserves won't be there anymore. What kept you going will have been depleted and God knows there's no getting it back once it's used as a price. Then you'll suffocate, and you'll be relieved as it happens, because the pain from all your organs failing at once will make you want to die."

"Dad, stop!" he said. He closed his eyes from me and panted heavily. "I hate this," he said. "Hate it! You don't know anything. None of you do."

He rolled on his side with his back to me so I got a good look at his bones shifting under his skin. His body shuddered with coughs that made me want to claw out my ears until they couldn't hear anymore.

I forced my voice steady and it ended up coming out overly calm. "I'm not the one with lack of understanding here, bud. I've seen it too many times. When humans try to mess with souls, people always get hurt. It never fails. You're not going to be the exception. Don't tell me I don't know that."

"Shut," he said, "up." He was sniffling on his pillow, but they were angry tears. "Since when did," he sniffled, "did you have the right? I forgot the part where I asked you to give up a damn thing."

I flinched back, fists clenching. He'd crossed a line not even my kids were allowed to cross. This was too much. I was ready to scream.

"Who the hell do you think you're talking to?" I shouted. "You think dying's hard? Give me a break! Dying's easy! I've come close plenty of times. Half the people I've ever cared about have done it! You think you're the victim here, Maes? You're lucky!"

His face flushed with anger, a sick, yellowed tone. He took a deep breath and I felt a sharp pang of concern realizing he was about to waste effort on raising his voice.

"You have a family," he said. "You got that. You got everything! I got a life that wouldn't last long enough to get a start! You got a life. I got a life expectancy. You're not one to talk! You have no idea what this is like! You're the one who wants to die!"

"I want you to outlive me! There's a difference!"

"I'm trying!"

"You're being reckless!" I said. "I'd rather have a week with you like this than ten minutes watching you die in agony after a rebound I saw coming a mile away!"

He trembled. His hand covered his wet eyes. His voice shook as he spoke in breaths. "I want to try."

My chest ached at the sight of him like someone had just slammed me with a wet brick. My eyes ached. My breath weakened. But I spoke. "I'd sooner have the doctors put you in restraints."

Maes's body curled under the sheets like I'd put him in physical pain. He hid his face from me in his pillow. "You save everyone but me."

I felt every muscle in my body go numb. My ribs set still in my skin, motionless as my breath ceased and my lungs ached from steadily lengthening lack of use. My lips became cool as the blood drained from my face.

I shook my head. "Don't. Don't say shit like that. I know you're scared, but you can only be so selfish with what you say before it would be better if you said nothing at all. You want to leave like that? Leave me thinking every morning I get up for the rest of my life that I saved everyone but you? Shit like that doesn't go away when you go away, Maes. That's the shit I'm going to remember first!"

Something seemed to snap in Maes on the last sentence. The glint of anger and betrayal took an abrupt turn to absolute shock. That was all I could think to classify it as. His eyes were big, pinned on me like an animal who'd just seen a hunter's gun. His mouth was soon trembling, breaths heaving similar to the build up of a sneeze. I soon found it was more the build up of a sob. He started up crying again, this time out of this broken sadness I suddenly wanted to trade back for the betrayal.

"I'm leaving," he gasped, "you behind."

My knees wobbled and I had to act fast to catch myself. I sank next to him on the bed. My eyes grew hot as he grabbed for my hand and sniffled against it.

"I'm," he said, "leaving."

I sniffed. "Yeah. You are."

"You'll be here," he said. "Not me."

"Yeah."

"Never again."

I rested my hand on his head and just let myself feel it there. That's how I'd held him as a baby. Supported his head in one hand and let the other hand handle the rest of him. He'd been so small at first. I'd been able to hold him with just one hand if I laid him just right. He'd loved it there. Like my hands had been made simply to keep him safe and any other purpose they served was an accidental bonus.

"You've never really thought about outliving anyone, have you?" I said.

Maes sniffled.

I nodded. "I'm sorry."

He shook his head against his pillow. I stroked his hair. He clung to my other hand like he was afraid I'd leave him.

I fought the tremble building in my chest. "It's not going to work, Maes."

He let out a weak sob. "I know."

"I love you." There was nothing left to say.

"I love—"

Winry's sneakers squeaked harshly against the floor. I looked up and caught her at the doorway with Sophie in tow, both wearing matching expressions it seemed. Scared fury. They'd heard. They'd heard something that was about to get me yelled at.

"You didn't!" Winry said. "You talked him out of it?"

I stood, glancing at Sophie. "Winry, let's take this to another room."

"Tell him he can do it!" she said. "Tell him right now! Don't you screw this up, Ed! I was gone for fifteen minutes!"

"Winry," I said. "Hallway."

She shook her head. "Everything was fine!"

"No," I said. "It wasn't. Just—"

"What did you say to him?" She came forward in strides. "What did you tell my son?"

"Mom," Maes croaked. "Mom, he didn't…"

Winry spoke over him. Whether she was ignoring him or just hadn't heard his soft voice in the chaos, I wasn't sure. "He figured it out, Ed! This is a chance! We have to at least try. What do we have to lose?"

"Don't do this in front of the kids."

"Don't lecture me on what to do in front of my kids!"

"Winry."

"You told Maes to die while I was in another room!" she said. "And you're telling me not to _argue_ in front of him?"

"Winry!"

She pointed in the general direction of the hospital bed without actually looking at it. Her eyes stabbed into me, the vulnerability in her tears overcome by the rage staring through them. "Tell him he can have the surgery, Ed. Tell him! Tell him right now or I swear I'll leave you when he's gone!"

My heart dropped.

Sophie was suddenly between us, grabbing at our shirts and shouting. "Stop it! You're just making it worse! Stop it! Just stop!"

I held Winry's gaze and spoke low. "You don't mean that. You don't know what you're saying."

It was clear she was biting back some emotions, but the frustration she allowed to show was enough to convince me she might've been more serious than I wanted her to be. At least in that moment. "I do mean it!" she said. "Tell Maes he can have the surgery or I'll…"

"The surgery's a death sentence!" I said. "You put him through that and he'll die!"

"He said—"

"He was lying!"

"No!" she said. "Maes never lies! You just got freaked out and changed his mind! You know he listens to you! You did this!"

If one more person told me it was my fault…

I swung my arms out at my sides, saying, "Dammit, Winry! What do you want me to say to you?"

As my arms swung out, my left hand made hard contact with something. It was so unexpected that it took me a moment to realize. The thudding sound from the impact registered first, then the dull pain shooting down the back of my hand where it had hit. Then I recognized the silky fabric of a hospital gown against my knuckles. My hand dropped. Sophie was screaming.

"Maes, no!" she said. "Don't get up!"

I turned sharply. He was there. Maes was right there, crumpled on the floor in nothing but his sweaty hospital gown and blue shorts. His body shook almost convulsively as he coughed red splatters into the crook of his arm. How the hell had he gotten there? Had he walked? No! He looked like a pile of bones left in a barren desert. He could barely even sit up without help. He couldn't have!

He was standing up.

"Maes, stop it!" Winry screamed.

She ran forward to him, she and Sophie both, but he was closer to me than they were to him and all it took was a staggering step before he was near enough to fall into my arms. His bony legs shook underneath him as he fought to stand. He felt like a baby bird about to break in my arms. Too hot. He was too hot!

"It's okay," he said, "Daddy."

His eyes had lost clarity. He was speaking out of time with himself. Something was wrong. He needed to breathe. Just breathe!

"You need oxygen," I said. "Winry, get the nurse!"

Maes clung with quivering hands to my cotton shirt. He was breathing a mile a minute, but his lips were turning blue like he wasn't breathing at all. "It's okay, Daddy." His pale face stretched into a smile, revealing bloodstains over his teeth from coughing. "Still here." He wheezed deeply. "Be angry. I don't…"

His bones turned limp in my arms and I stumbled to catch his head before it could fall back. His eyes met mine, smile thin but present.

"Don't mind," he said.

His smile fell. I watched his eyes roll back. The chilling sound of a throaty gag ripped from his chest and all the sudden there was dark red warmth pooling from his mouth down his shirt. It collected on the ground in puddles. I swiped my arm under the bend in his knees and gathered him in my arms.

"He's not breathing!" I said.

Winry was already in with the nurse, but the woman took one look at Maes and ran to get the doctor. Winry shouted after her to let one of us get the doctor instead, but then the doctor was in and Winry got to shout at him instead. Another nurse came in after the original one and tried to get Winry to leave. Then, upon seeing Sophie in tears at the door decided to take on the easier task of physically forcing Sophie out.

"I don't know what he was doing!" Winry ranted like it even mattered at this point. "Hey, what are you doing? Don't touch my daughter!"

"Mama!" Sophie shrieked from the nurse's unsteady arms.

"What do you think, Winry?" I said bitterly as I set Maes back on his bed. The doctor and other gathering staff swarmed. I looked at my wife. "You threatened to leave me right in front of him. He was trying to stop a fight!"

"You're blaming me?" she said.

"I wanted to go in another room!"

"You did this!" she sobbed. "You hit him! You hit him in the chest because you couldn't hold your temper for a damn minute and now he's…oh, God! Why isn't he breathing?"

"I didn't do it on purpose!" I looked at the door. Sophie was gone. "It…it was an accident!"

Winry wasn't paying attention. "Why isn't he breathing? Why isn't my baby breathing?"

A male nurse with significant stature came at Winry and started 'guiding' her to the door. "Ma'am, you need to step out."

Winry screamed. "Why isn't my baby breathing?"

I stumbled back. It was like my heart was stopping short. That's what she'd said. That's what she'd said the day he was born. That was it. One of the first things out of her mouth.

_Why isn't my baby breathing? _

I grabbed my hair, head shaking. It was over. It was happening. It was happening this time. He was gone. I watched as crowds of hospital staff ran around my son's still body. Gloved hands filled syringes and stabbed them into his arms and body. Three generic faces were taking turns tilting his jaw back and shining light down his throat as they guided a tube down it. A nurse pumped her hands against Maes's heart over and over while another checked his pulse. Someone ran in with an IV bag filled with red and I watched them poke it into his arm. Then one of the doctors was putting on a mask and a new set of gloves. A nurse was disinfecting the side of Maes's ribcage with the brown liquid antiseptic Winry had used on me during the surgery involved in my port upgrade over a decade ago. I saw the glint of a scalpel in the doctor's hand.

"He's not," I said, "going to make it."

My knees swerved.

The staff didn't miss an opportunity. The big male nurse grabbed me while I was weak and pushed me out of the room in a few forceful shoves. For a split moment, I wondered how he'd managed to get Winry to cooperate. Then I was staggering backward into the waiting room and the door was swinging shut on my face.

"No, you need to come now!" Winry yelled. "He's not breathing!"

I turned to see her standing at the back wall with a phone against her ear. Sophie had her head buried into Winry's side and her shoulders were shrugging with sobs. So, that's what got Winry out of the room. She'd found something to make her feel like she had some control in the situation.

"No, I'm not fine, Sig!" she said. "Just tell Mrs. Curtis get to the hospital! We need an alchemist!" I watched her fiddle compulsively with the cord. "Of course we got the doctor first! You think I'd be calling right now if…" I watched her sink her face into her hand. Her body quaked. "Just please. Please. Get on the train and…and come here."

Winry set the phone on its hook. She looked up at me with raw eyes that cut like rusted razors. I felt something in my throat tighten. I leaned against the wall and breathed. I tried to talk myself out of crying with my daughter in the room. It didn't work.

…

As the doctor explained to Winry and me that it was time to say goodbye, my mind became flooded with a hundred voices all shouting the same thing. I covered my ears and tried not to listen to anyone.

* * *

**Don't cry. You guys know he comes out okay.**


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